Staff Reporter
MADURAI: Only the parents and not the neighbours or relatives of a girl could be prosecuted for giving her in marriage by concealing physical abnormalities, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has ruled.
Justice G. Rajasuria passed the ruling while quashing criminal proceedings initiated against the neighbours of a 27-year-old girl who did not attain puberty.
The Judge said that there was no legal or fiduciary obligation on part of the neighbours to disclose the abnormalities to the groom’s family.
“There exists fiduciary relationship between the parties to the marriage and their respective parents towards each other,” the Judge said.
Pointing out that Section 415 of Indian Penal Code defines cheating as fraudulent/dishonest inducement or concealment of facts which causes physical, mental or monetary loss to a person, the Judge said that there were no materials to prove that the neighbours had intentionally cheated the groom.
Moreover, the marriage was organised through a private bureau and not by the neighbours.
Even assuming that the neighbours were relatives of the girl, Mr. Justice Rajasuria said:
“In this part of the country, it is common knowledge that the relatives of a bride are in the habit of not speaking ill of her when they are enquired before marriage. That is part and parcel of the culture.
Hence, the expectation of the complainant (groom) that they ought to have disclosed the physical defects of the girl is a farfetched one.”
